Reindeer sandwich

My kids loved this lunch! Leave it to Martha to think that you could turn a gingerbread man cookie cutter upside down and make it look like a reindeer. Take a few extra minutes to make this lunch, and really get your kids excited for Christmas.

To make:

Melt a few tablespoons of chocolate chips in the microwave, on 20 second intervals, until the whole dish of chocolate is melted. Pour the chocolate into a small plastic bag, and cut the corner of the bag. On a piece of wax paper, pipe some small antlers. Place the wax paper in the freezer while you make the rest of the sandwich.

I made a ham sandwich for Claire. To make the eyes, I cut a mini marshmallow in half, and stuck a mini chocolate chip on each marshmallow. I placed a red smartie on the tip of the sandwich for the nose. Take the wax paper out of the freezer, and carefully peel off the antlers, and place on the sandwich.

That's it! I hope that your kids enjoy it as much as mine did.

Linking up with: Six Sister's Stuff &  Skip to my Lou & Tip Junkie & Weekly Kids Co-op & Tatertots and Jello  & Rust & Sunshine

cork stamped ornaments

I love these cork print ornaments that Claire and I made. They are not made using traditional Christmas colours, but obviously you could make these with whatever colours you prefer. They require a little planning, but don't take very much time to make.

Required supplies:
cardstock (I used 4x4 paper)
paint (various shades)
paper scraps for flag/pennant thing
sewing machine (OR staple a length of bakers twine or ribbon to the ornament)
scissors
black pen/marker
wine cork

To start, I cut my cardstock into 4x4 squares. Rather than let Claire go all willy nilly stamping the cork all over the page, I made a few very tiny, very light dots with a pencil where I wanted her to stamp the ornaments. She had fun choosing what colours went where.

When the paint was dry, I sewed a line from the top of the ornament to the top of the page. You could just cut a piece of twine or ribbon and staple it on the page. Draw little hooks on the top of the ornaments.

Use two paper scraps to create the flag/pennant at the top of the page. I used a couple of Christmas rub ons that I had. You could just write Christmas words, but I don't always love my handwriting.

I chose just to make these as decorations, but you could use a larger piece of paper, and make it into a card, or conversely, using a smaller bit of paper and make gift tags.

Linking up with: Six Sister's Stuff &  Skip to my Lou & Tip Junkie & Weekly Kids Co-op & Tatertots and Jello

sprinkle pudding cups

 I love this idea of lining a milk cup with sprinkles. It has been beautifully photographed here. As one of the kids Advent activities, we had a little Christmas tea party yesterday. I had a lot of Christmas sprinkles kicking around, and these cups only took a few extra minutes to make. They were definitely worth making, the kids LOVED them.

To make the glasses, grab whatever chocolate you've on hand. I used chocolate chips the first time I made them, and bittersweet chocolate the second time. Melt it in a double boiler, or in the microwave on intervals. Dip the glass in the chocolate, and then in a bowl of sprinkles. They will set quickly.

My sister (is law) brought over some of the whipped shortbreads that we love so much here. I made Christmas Rice Krispie squares, and homemade chocolate pudding. I used this recipe, but I found it a bit too chocolatey. Never thought that I'd say that! It would be just as nice with
whatever store bought pudding you like. Whenever we have tea parties here, I fill the tea pot with chocolate milk, and the creamer with milk. The kids love stirring the two together.

For our advent activity today, we're going to write and post our letters to Santa. The anticipation is starting to build...

Linking up with: Six Sister's Stuff &  Skip to my Lou & Tip Junkie & Weekly Kids Co-op & Tatertots and Jello 

cute penguin craft

What a cute penguin craft to brighten up these dark winter days! I am so proud of Claire, because she cut all of the penguin pieces all by herself. This was just the second time that I traced shapes on paper and asked her to cut them out.

What you need:
black paper
white paper
orange paper (scrap)
patterned paper (with a small pattern)
12x12 background piece of paper (your colour choice)
decorative ribbon
black marker
scissors
glue
template

Start by printing off the template. Cut the pieces out of the template and trace them on the paper. The main body and wings need to be traced on black paper (I used a white colouring pencil which worked well.) Then penguin tummy and eyes need to be traced on white paper. I used an embossed piece of white paper for the tummy. I like the extra piece of texture that it adds to the penguin. Trace the beak on orange paper. I forgot to include the template that we used for the earmuffs, so just make sure the circles that you use are bigger than the penguin's eyes.

Have your child cut out all of the shapes. Once cut, you can start to assemble your penguin on the paper. We started with the main body, followed by the penguin tummy, eyes, beak (fold in half) and earmuffs. I cut a scrap of ribbon for the long bit of the scarf, and then two small pieces for the tails of the scarf. Once Claire glued the scarf on the penguin, she glued the wings on, so that they covered up the cut edges of the ribbon. Lastly, she drew (traced) a line to connect the ear muffs, and dots for the eyes.

Click here for the link to the template.

Linking up with: Six Sister's Stuff &  Skip to my Lou & Tip Junkie & Weekly Kids Co-op & Tatertots and Jello

handprint wreath

I still love doing handprint crafts, but now that Simon's 2 1/2, they're increasingly harder to do with him. He's a very independent two year old, who always knows just what to do, even without instruction. Read- he doesn't want any help. From anyone. Ever. I was so happy when he let me help him place his hand on the paper, not 1, not 2, but seven times! He did a great job using his thumb to make a few red berries the next day (once all the green paint was dry. I did not want to risk messing up all of those beautiful handprints.)

I knew that I wanted to add a bow to the wreath to finish it off. I tried drawing one myself, but that was a huge fail. I thought that a ribbon bow would look too small on such a large wreath (and I didn't want to buy ribbon just for this project.) Imagine my delight when I saw that Ellinee had pinned a link to their paper bows. I love the red chevron ones that they have posted, but my printer is running low on ink, so I printed the template and then cut out the bow using some patterned paper that I had on hand. The 3D bow was the perfect finishing touch for this handprint wreath.

Linking up with: Six Sister's Stuff &  Skip to my Lou & Tip Junkie & Weekly Kids Co-op & Tatertots and Jello

Christmas wreath craft

I think that this is my favorite Christmas craft yet. It was so simple to make too. My own Christmas cards that I'm making this weekend will be a spin off of this craft.

To start, I mixed a few different shades of paint together. I mixed green with white, green with yellow, and then just used plain green. Unfortunately, the contrast didn't show up as much as I'd hoped on the finished product. Claire stamped the rim of a small glass in the paint and then stamped it on the paper. Three times, once in each different shade of green. When the green paint was dry, Claire used a q-tip that she dipped in red paint to make the berries on the wreath. I tied a small bow with a bit of red ribbon that I found in my stash. To finish the card off, I used a stamp and gold ink pad to stamp the words love hope peace joy.

Are you making your own Christmas cards this year? I will have the kids make a few to send to their friends who don't live near us anymore.

Linking up with: Six Sister's Stuff &  Skip to my Lou & Tip Junkie & Weekly Kids Co-op & Tatertots and Jello

Rudolph sandwich

I love making these cute lunches for my kids. They don't even think twice about eating them. They hardly take any extra time to make, this one took just over 5 minuets. That's it!

What you'll need:
bread (I used whole wheat and white bread)
1 mini marshmallow
2 mini chocolate chips
1 red smartie/m&m
heart cookie cutter (could use a large circle one)
small circle cookie cutter

We always have a million loaves of bread here, so I used a whole wheat bread for the big part of the sandwich, and white bread for the nose. Use what you have on hand. As you can see from the picture above, I used two slices of whole wheat bread and made a (peanut butter and jam) sandwich, and just one piece of bread folded over to make another peanut butter and jam sandwich.

Use the large heart cookie cutter to cut the large sandwich. Use the smaller circle cookie cutter to cut a circle from the small, folded over sandwich. Cut the marshmallow in half, and stick a mini chocolate chip on each sticky part of the marshmallow. Use the leftover crusts to form the antlers. Then it's time to put it all together. Place the heart on the plate, upside down. Add the antlers to the heart. Place the small circle on top of the heart sandwich to make the nose. Add the red smartie on top of the small circle sandwich. Add the eyes above the nose.That's it! It took me longer to write this blog post than to make this adorable lunch.

Linking up with: Six Sister's Stuff &  Skip to my Lou & Tip Junkie & Weekly Kids Co-op & Tatertots and Jello